


Perditus Vice

by Symmet



Series: Vice Series [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, AU in which Michael decides to mess with the cannon, AU where destiel is cannon, M/M, Michael gets bored/curious/creepy, Michael is a destiel shipper probably, Vice series, decides to fuck around a bit, decides to learn about Sams past via assumed parallel universe, forgot to mention that, frickin Michael, he doesn't like where it's going, hella au, messes up on the parallel universe part, right - Freeform, yeah - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-15
Updated: 2014-08-15
Packaged: 2018-02-13 05:52:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2139489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Symmet/pseuds/Symmet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The third and final installment in the Vice Series. Sam is gone for a week, and Michael is curious about Sam's past so he tries to observe it via assumed parallel universe. Except as it turns out, it's not as parallel as Michael thought...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The one where Michael decides to meddle in cannon.

Sam had to go to Hell with Lucifer for a week. Well, a week up here. Down there, it is considerably longer, Michael admits quietly to himself.  
  
And yet he is still vaguely aware of the fact that he is taking the change poorly.  
“Brooding,” as his younger brother, Castiel said.  
“Pouting,” as Dean put it.  
  
Michael glares at a dusty clump of grass and ignores the slightly human urge to kick it.  
  
Lucifer was going down there to talk to the demonic assembly.  
  
Michael had revealed himself as their true benefactor (sort of) while he’d been in the pit, and they hadn’t taken the news so well; after all, he wasn’t their dad. He was their uncle.  
  
(As Dean ‘helpfully’ pointed out, every angel was a demon’s uncle, much to his own and Castiel’s annoyance.)  
  
Lucifer finally agreed to go down, and seeing how miserable he was, Sam was quick to offer his own company. After all, he had been the supposed ‘boy king’, the general of Hell and all it’s inhabitants.  
  
Michael hadn’t realized how… unpleasant it would be without Sam. Dean was, most of the time, bearable, although he had none of the drawing charm of Sam (for Michael at least - he knew Castiel felt differently about the hunter, as their relations would suggest). Also, he was far too prone to immaturity. And he is not as tall. Nor comforting.  
  
Perhaps Michael is biased.  
  
It has only been two hours, and Michael feels it wearing away at him. They are not ‘joined at the hip’ as Dean unflatteringly put it, but knowing that he has to be at least another 597600 seconds (the blink of a blink to an archangel) without Sam makes him fidgety.  
An annoyingly _human_ trait.  
After the Pit, after so long, waiting, Michael has discovered a surprisingly strong aversion to the idea of waiting. Anything that requires patience (a virtue - _ha_!) makes him anxious down to the pit of his grace.  
  
It doesn’t show - an archangel feeling the strange warmth of humanity in his motions and habits can still choose whether to let them manifest, like the fidgeting - but he feels it, small and warm and liquid inside his marble chest.  
  
He would do better if he hadn’t known when Sam was coming back - an hour or a month or a year. Then he doesn’t have to wait for it so much as exist as himself until then.  
  
Why does he care so much, in any case?  
  
He is an archangel. He should be able to choose what he wants to feel or not. But this, this he has no control over. Just as before, when his grace was incomplete.  
  
The angel version of being soulless.  
  
The version of him that Sam was quick to forgive, but not forget, to love just as he loves Michael now.  
The kind of love he deserves and Michael would fight to convey, to show him.  
  
Soulless. Sam had mentioned something about being soulless for an amount of time.  
  
An idea, the kind that should be cast away, because it is weak and flimsy and grasping for devotion it doesn’t deserve, squirms into his mind.  
  
He has nothing better to do for a week.  
  
Why not see this soulless Sam? Why not test whether Michael is as pardoning as this human he loves so much?  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Michael knows that the whole Host of heaven will notice if he goes back in time. Though he shouldn’t care what they think, the idea of this makes him unwilling to proceed. As if they will follow, curious, testing this newfound free will, and watch him struggle, or fail, or how weak, how indecisive, he becomes around this human.

  
However, strangely enough, the passing in between of worlds like this one - alternate universes that you can enter through a pocket space - is not regulated.

  
Most worlds are not protected from unwelcome visitors, but this particular universe is.  
Unless you hail from this world, or latch on to something that does, you cannot get through to it.   
Much like the rules regarding Purgatory, or the weaker ones regarding Hell (which was attached to this world, after all).  
  
Leaving, however, was a different matter entirely - any angel could write Enochian could leave as they pleased, any visit any number of worlds, like walking through a beaded curtain made of threads. The only thing to consider was where they were going - some worlds channeled grace or magic or “supernatural” forms of energy badly, or in unpredictable ways - there were whole universes where it looked largely like no angels, no demons, no monsters existed, because they were too weak to be considered such. Going there would likely drain one of their power, and if they were lucky (or desperate) they would be able to get the angel version of SOS through “angel radio waves” as Dean liked to say.  
  
And there were worlds quite the opposite.  
  
That said, Michael wasn’t looking for much - just a parallel world running along the same-ish course of history.  
  
The truth was, he was just looking for a world with a soulless Sam.  
  
He perhaps assumed that it was more similar than an initial inspection suggested. Most likely because he didn’t inspect it.

  
He set the parameters for it with a soulless Sam and a Grace-forgiving universe, and assumed the first one he’d end up in would be only barely tangent - like searching for the name of a website and assuming the first link to come up was a direct one.

The results would not be what he had intended.


	3. Chapter 3

Sam turns out to be in a log cabin in the middle of the wilderness.

 

He found Sam just as a Lamia was attempting to skewer him with her claws, an old gold, like the scales protruding from her abdomen and continuing down the length of her being; the ripped remains of jeans and shoes flattened beneath the immense muscled weight of a snake’s writhing body.  
  
The beast was dead before it could cast it’s golden eyes on the new arrival, an angel blade eagerly drinking the tainted blood in it’s gut _it consumed **children**_ before tugged out cleanly, efficiently, like their small screams don't reverberate in his Grace. Lamias were particualrly revolting beasts, and the pain of hundreds of souls now avenged sings out in his grace like a fading gong. Michael threw it aside like a doll, hundreds of pounds ancient, powerful muscle like a pile of blankets discarded during summer, and crouched next to the fatally wounded hunter.  
  
Who then proceeded to attempt to stab him.  
  
With ease, Michael deflected the blade (he could have ignored it and let Sam stab him, but his own Sam had gotten this shirt for him, not at a particularly expensive establishment, he was readily informed, and only because he was still wearing the tattered remains of this vessel’s clothing - from several millennium ago, but he still meant to keep it in good condition.) and placed his hand over Sam’s chest, where sure and ugly claws had pressed into his bones and blood with accuracy and intent, where small, glittering scales had embedded themselves in the flesh, tearing at it. The other he gingerly slid on Sam’s back as support, though the hunter flinched away from his touch, weakly, from loss os blood, “Easy,” he murmured, “Here to help.”  
  
He drew his hand over it and graced the scales to cease their existence, but they had been coated with a numbing venom, and Sam cursed as the relief from pain was suddenly absent. He began to heal it - slower than a finger snap, taking his time because he could, making sure it was done well, not haphazardly.  
  
“And why is that?” Sam bit out, fists clenched at his sides.  
Michael spared a glance at the hunter’s face, scrunched up, but easing as the pain faded from Michael’s fingertips, "I'm a friend."  
  
The moment their eyes meet, however, Sam’s face contorts again - from tension, now, “You’re an angel,” the hunter supplies as if it disproves the statement.  
  
Was Sam even supposed to know about angels yet?  
  
“Yes. Although I am not… affiliated with the Heaven… of this world” The last bit is, to Michael’s slight shame, muttered too low for the hunter to hear.

The hunter relaxed, although not completely, “A rebel?”

“Not…necessarily. They don’t… consider me a player… because they don’t know about me at the moment.” _Lying through omission is still lying_ , he’d heard Sam say once. A twinge of guilt plays in his grace, but this Sam is soulless, and lies are like breath for him. And he’s still technically telling the truth. He can almost feel his own Sam leaning over his shoulder at this damaged, soulless creature, making a 'bitch face' as Dean liked to say behind his brother's back, upset with the both of them.  
  
The hunter watches him with wary eyes, before letting them flick to the corpse, it’s gold still shimmering dangerously from the shadows where the torso and thick coils were cast.

“I needed that thing, by the way. Only one of her.” The human adds.

Michael waits until the wound is completely sealed (he refuses himself the right to linger. This is not his hunter, and more so, this hunter, once aware of any weaknesses, would not hesitate to play and prey upon them) before retracting his hand and saying, offhandedly, “That wasn’t the first. Old, but not that old.”

At least he assumes that’s why it mattered. The oldest would be completely gold - not just scales and claws and eyes.  
Skin, teeth, and hair; blood and organs.  
Everything but it’s soul was gold; the soul would be black for such a revolting creature. Like Tar.

Sam froze, but then rolled with it, accepting Michael’s offered hand as he allowed himself to be pulled to his feet.

“Do I know you?” Sam said suddenly.

Michael almost grinned, “No,” and didn’t resist the, “but _I_ know _you_ ,” that cheekily followed in it’s wake.

Sam leaned forward staring intently. For a moment, it looked as if he wasn’t getting anything.

His gaze suddenly snapped to something behind Michael, and he froze.

“ **Michael**.” he hissed, stumbling back, away.

_The wings._


	4. Chapter 4

He **_shouldn’t_ ** know about angels, Michael decides, perhaps too late.  
“Sam?” He inquires uncertainly, and then graces the door sealed shut when the hunter turns to run.  
The soulless human spun around, subdued terror, cornered in this log cabin far from civilization, “how did you get out?” he said.  
“Out? Of?” _Depression?_ Michael’s mind provides a tad comically.  
“Out of the _Cage_.” Sam hissed in disbelief.  
Sam gave him an incredulous look when Michael stares at him in shock, face blank.  
Michael frowns.  
“Where is your brother?” He says instead, trying to be conversational and yet change the subject.  
Instead, it closes Sam off more, “What about him?” He says, although if he’d had a soul, he would have been far more defensive.  
Michael gave him a look.  
Sam warily acquiesces, probably out of fear rather than a charitable mood, “He’s…not with me anymore. He couldn’t hunt even if he knew I was… he has a _family_. That would hold him back. Hold _me_ back.”  
“Dean?” Michael says blankly, “A _family?_ With _who_? Castiel?”  
He says it seriously but it shocks Sam into a snort, almost choking on his laughter.  
“Nah. No clue what happened to Castiel.”  
 _Wait_. He shouldn’t even know who Castiel _is_.  
Michael took a step forward and immediately, Sam shrunk away.  
The phrase _‘For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction_ ’ rises unkindly in his mind, but Michael steps on it and swipes it aside, _this is soulless Sam_ , he reminds himself, chides himself.  
“Sam, I just saved you.”  
When the hunter still doesn’t relax, he sighs.  
“I mean you no harm.”  
Sam suddenly froze, “ _Is Lucifer out, too_?” he hisses in greater horror.  
What? **_What?_**  
The cabin experiences a minor tremor as Michael panics, fails to reign in his grace in time to prevent it from getting out in a burst of emotion. Sam flattens himself against the wall.  
Michael, with great effort, controls himself.  
The single lightbulb had already burst, and Sam looked read to bolt.  
“ _How_ exactly, did _both_ Lucifer and I end up in The Cage _together_?”  
Sam’s expression folds in confusion before twitching, and Michael sees the exact moment he realizes Michael doesn’t know everything - doesn’t know _anything_.  
Michael is in no mood to deal with a Soulless creature attempting to con and wheedle and play their silver tongued games.  
“ **Samuel, do not even _attempt_ to manipulate the situation.** ”  
Sam glares.  
Michael sighs in disgust when he realizes that it is very easy for a soulless creature to empty and clear their mind.  
Sam’s mind is blank.  
Of course.  
Michael gathered his grace in one deep breath, reached forward to grab the startled hunter, and left.


End file.
